The Crown’s Weight
The great hall was silent.
The bodies of the guards lay where they had fallen, their blood already drying on the black and white stone. The torches flickered in their iron sconces, casting long shadows that seemed to move on their own. The golden throne loomed behind Rhaena, its jewels glittering in the dim light, its monstrous curves casting a shadow that stretched across the floor like a claw.
She stood before it.
She did not sit.
She was not ready.
Corin approached, his sword still wet with blood. He knelt.
“Your Grace, the castle is secured. The remaining guards have surrendered. The servants are coming out of hiding. The nobles are… uncertain.”
“Uncertain.”
“They do not know whether to celebrate or mourn. Malrik ruled for twenty years. Some of them prospered under his reign. Some of them lost everything.”
“They will learn to follow me. Or they will leave.”
“And if they refuse?”
“Then they will be treated as enemies of the crown.”
Corin hesitated.
“Your Grace—”
“I do not have the luxury of mercy. Not yet. Mercy comes after justice. Justice comes after order. Order comes after obedience.”
Theron stood at the edge of the hall, his wounded arm wrapped in a strip of cloth torn from his own cloak. His face was pale, his good eye was dim, but his voice was steady.
“Your Grace, you sound like him.”
“Like who?”
“Like Malrik.”
Rhaena’s blood went cold.
“I am nothing like Malrik.”
“You have just threatened to treat your own people as enemies.”
“They are not my people yet.”
“They will never be your people if you treat them like prisoners.”
She turned to face him.
“Then what would you have me do? Throw a feast? Forgive them for serving the man who killed my father? Pretend that the last twenty years did not happen?”
“I would have you remember who you are. You are not a conqueror. You are not a usurper. You are a healer. A servant. A woman who kneaded bread and scrubbed floors while the nobles feasted and the soldiers fought.”
“I am not that woman anymore.”
“You are. You will always be. The crown does not change who you are. It only reveals it.”
Rhaena touched the iron crown on her head.
It was still too big.
Still too heavy.
Still too cold.
“The grandmother said the throne is a cage. The first queen said the throne is a seed. The last god said the throne is a harvest. Which one is true?”
Theron was silent for a long moment.
“All of them. None of them. The throne is what you make it.”
The doors of the great hall opened.
A figure entered — small, hunched, wrapped in a cloak of gray wool. She walked slowly, leaning on a cane, her steps echoing in the silence.
Rhaena recognized her.
“Elara.”
The healer from the temple. The woman with red hair and green eyes and a smile that was sad and tired and full of years.
“Your Grace,” Elara said. “I came as soon as I heard.”
“Heard what?”
“That the usurper is dead. That the true queen has returned. That the kingdom is free.”
“Free?”
“Free.”
She reached the foot of the dais.
She knelt.
“Rise,” Rhaena said.
Elara rose.
Her green eyes were wet.
“Your father would be proud.”
“Would he? He died to give me time. I spent that time hiding in a kitchen.”
“You spent that time surviving. Surviving is not hiding. Surviving is the first step toward living.”
Rhaena looked at the throne.
At the golden monster.
At the jewels and the bone.
“Take it away,” she said.
Corin stared at her.
“Your Grace?”
“The throne. Take it away. Melt it down. Use the gold to feed the people. Use the jewels to buy medicine. Use the bone to build a hospital.”
“Your Grace, the throne is the symbol of your power.”
“The throne is a cage. I will not sit in a cage. I will sit on a simple chair, like my father before me. I will rule with my hands, not with my jewels.”
The servants came forward.
They hesitated.
“Do it,” Rhaena said.
They moved.
The golden throne groaned as they lifted it, its legs scraping against the stone. They carried it through the great hall, out the doors, into the courtyard.
Rhaena watched it go.
The crown was still on her head.
The weight was still heavy.
But she did not feel like a prisoner.
She felt like a queen.